Breakfall (26 page)

“How can I forgive you unless I can see that you are sorry? That you really mean it?”

“Okay. Okay. I’m sorry you’re upset.”

“Not just upset. Traumatized. I’m disgraced before my family and all who matter to me. I don’t see any other way out, Joe Green.”

“So aside from staying out of the courtroom, your forgiveness is his Holy Grail right now,” Adrian said. “He’s an unusual case. Most rapists just follow the rage-batter-rape-kill scenario, but this guy seems more interested in controlling the situation—and maybe getting some fringe benefits out of it. And he doesn’t seem to think he can get those the ordinary way. Giving him hope was a good move. He is stalking you and reporting to you on all your movements anyway. It gives him a sense of control. Best as I can tell, that’s all he does. He’s completely obsessed with you.”

Adrian frowned. “When do you think you’re most vulnerable?”

“Whenever I’m alone,” Sean replied without hesitation. “But several people walk with me from class to class. Sheila recruited some of my aikido students to keep me company, and Nell did the same with some of the karate students.” He felt an embarrassed blush flood his face, feeling like a useless problem child.

“You don’t like it much.”

“No. I don’t.”

“If he’s unable to approach you alone, it will push him into doing something unwise. That’s to our advantage.” Adrian’s voice was smooth and hypnotic, a world away from the cocky young man who issued Sean his first challenge at the Warehouse.

“So you think he’ll make his move soon?” Sean shifted in his chair. Pacing back and forth got old within the confines of Mark’s small office.

“Well… you could force his hand a little. Insist on a personal meeting, but never be alone. That will give us more options when he makes his move.”

Sean nodded. “Mark thinks it will happen after dark.”

“Probably. He’ll probably want you to meet him immediately after he calls. Stall him. Make sure Mark and his team have enough time to get into position. How much time will you need, Mark?”

Sean shifted his eyes to the police detective.

“Give us half an hour, minimum. An hour would be better,” Mark said. “You got your spray, Sean?”

Sean nodded and pulled the black, orange-topped canister out of his jacket pocket.

“Good. Keep it that way.”

I
T
HAD
been three days since December 1, when they handed the recording to the police. Asbjorn felt like he was sitting on a ticking bomb. Classes and labs flowed by on invisible eddies of time. Mealtimes. Bedtimes. He watched Sean’s back disappear out the door or down the campus, accompanied by another student, never alone.

Sometimes, Asbjorn walked with him, but never often enough to make their deeper connection apparent to an outside observer. It was killing him—the feeling of letting go, of no control. He felt the roaring of blood in his temples, then, and noted his morning coffee didn’t get along with his stomach anymore. He forced himself to take deep breaths, centering himself.

Compartmentalizing.

Thinking of possible solutions to four-dimensional matrix series, equations forced into animated suspension in his head, bending his will to solve them and only then check his work on paper. He would do almost anything to distract himself, and only Sean’s agreement to keep him in the loop made the stress of the situation bearable.

“Deal?”

“Deal.”

Yet he saw the resentment in the cocoa-brown eyes, eyebrows scrunched in a scowl that asserted itself as Sean’s default expression. Sean hated being under surveillance as much as he hated having to accept the help of others. There had been a wild, volatile quality to their lovemaking the night before. Sean strained against the merest hint of Asbjorn’s gentle control the way he strained to keep his temper in check when he greeted his daily escorts. Asbjorn felt fear then. Now that they were finally settling into a rhythm and had a plan, the period of relative peace felt like the calm right before the storm.

S
EAN
’
S
PHONE
rang, and he fished around in his pocket. The phone, the pepper spray, the recording device. He slid the jack into its port and flipped the phone open.

“How are you doing, Sean?” The now-familiar voice was almost a relief—relief from endless waiting. The relief of knowing the resolution was near.

“None of your business, Joe Green.” Sean took note of the date immediately. December fifth. Sunday.

“Sean. That grand jury in ten days. Don’t go.”

“Why not, Joe Green?” Sean rolled the name on his tongue, mocking
it.

“My friends.”

“Your friends made a bad mistake. Not my fault they got caught.”

“You interfered.” The voice growled, seething.

“I thought of not going, but… I can’t
not
go. I have to obey the law.”

“That doesn’t work for me, Sean. If they roll on me, they will spoil our fun. We could have had a good time together.”

Sean shuddered, the smooth wall of a coffee-shop bathroom stall suddenly less solid behind him. “I’m here just to study, and you screwed that up for me. I… I’ve lost all honor on account of you and don’t have much to live for anymore. There is just one honorable thing to do.”

“Whaddaya mean?”

Sean sighed, his mind reaching for something, anything, this man might know about that sort of a thing. “I may be Irish, but I come from an ancient family of Viking warriors. Our sense of honor is not something you will ever understand. If my family loses face, there’s just one thing to do.”

Sean shut his mouth. The thing to do was to challenge the offending party to a duel, not commit suicide—and Sean bit his lip hard enough to draw blood in silent hope that his prey was ignorant of the customs of ancient Vikings.

Silence stretched for a short while.

“Like that Japanese-suicide thing?”

“Exactly,” Sean improvised. “Unless I had a reason to forgive you, I guess….” He let the words trail off, hoping his adversary would come to a logical conclusion.

“Oh.” The man who called himself Joe Green thought for a bit.

“Then I guess you better not do anything dumb, Sean. Remember how I said we’d have good time together? Next time will be very good for you.”

Sean heard the line go dead.

He dialed a number he had committed to memory. The man answered on the third ring.

“Hey, Mark. Got another one for you.”

N
EXT
M
ONDAY
’
S
lab was long and arduous. His oscilloscope wouldn’t settle down, making it impossible to take readings on his circuit.

“Where’s the interference coming from?” Nobody had the same problem. Professor Nimmo peeked over his shoulder.

“Did you turn everything off?” she asked.

“Yes. Even my laptop.”

“How about your cell phone?”

“I never turn my… oh.” Sean cursed himself for wasting hours, building a needless Faraday cage instead of just pushing that one button on top of his phone. He felt strange doing it. This was the first time he’d turned his cell phone off since the night of the attack. Surrounded by twenty-one students, he felt a sudden sense of isolation with his lifeline dead. It angered him and he pushed against it, scowling.

He settled on his wooden stool, tuning his oscilloscope all over again. It was turning into a long day already.

T
HEY
SAT
in what used to be the parlor of the Pile, a gracious room with tall ceilings and architectural pillars flanking the ancient, mosaic-tile fireplace. Old green curtains were drawn across the bay window, shielding them from view as they got to work on one of the ratty sofas. Mark’s laptop sat on the scarred, wooden coffee table.

Sean watched as he and Adrian downloaded yesterday’s telephone call.

As they listened to it, Sean felt numb inside.

“This is great, Sean. Now we can get him on tampering with a witness too.”

Two women walked into the parlor, dressed in the college uniform of well-worn jeans and hoodie shirts. They turned the large old television on.

“Hey, Katie, hey, Suzanne. We’re in a meeting.” Sean greeted them, hoping they would turn the TV off.

Suzanne plopped down in the opposite sofa, clicking the remote.

“This is police business. Could I ask you to give us a few more minutes, please?” Mark’s voice was more of an order than a request.

Suzanne turned the TV off, her face sullen. She tossed her curly brown hair over her shoulder with her left hand and glared at Sean. “You should have moved when the administration offered you a new room. Your presence just puts the rest of us in danger.”

Mark gave her an annoyed look. “His presence here ensures we catch the guy so you and your friends can be safe.”

“You could catch him from somewhere else,” Katie chimed in, playing with her phone.

“It’s so annoying, having these goings-on in here. And the other students keep asking about it all the time. Especially after the paper came out with that story.”

“What story?” Sean asked, alarmed.

“It’s in here somewhere.” Katie pointed at a pile of newspapers, both college and local, on the table.

Exasperated, Suzanne tossed the remote onto the table and stood up again. “We’ve talked to the dean. We don’t feel safe with you around. Did you get the message on the dorm meeting with the school psychologist on Thursday?”

“It’s in my e-mail.”

“Yeah. Think about moving, Sean. Please?” The two women exited the tense atmosphere of the parlor, leaving its faded grandeur behind.

Sean met Adrian’s eyes and straightened from his slouch. He felt a sudden stiffening of his spine, a tightening of his jaw. “Like hell! I’m not moving out of here. They’re just a bunch of cowards. If I move, the perp will get tipped off, and it will be so much longer before we catch him. Then
they
can walk around, playing bait.”

“Okay.” Adrian’s voice was calm, noncommittal. “You’ll still take precautions, I take it?”

“Yeah.” Sean’s hand wandered inside his pocket. He fingered the trigger guard on his pepper spray canister.

“Let’s see what the stupid paper leaked this time,” Mark groaned, pushing himself out of the sofa.

A
SBJORN
’
S
BARE
feet padded on the cool dance-studio floor. He viewed the way his students lined up, expressions of frustration and concentration mingled on their faces. He sighed, feeling like he was not getting through to them. The feeling was not pleasant.

“All right. Look. Sometimes, the simplest things are the hardest ones to do. We’ve been working on leading with the punching fist, and you got that. Now hold that idea. Our next step is to precede the punching hand by pulling back with the opposite arm. Elbow back.” He swung his elbow back on its natural diagonal, his left fist stopping by his left hip. “Now see how this action activates the whole system and my right fist
wants
to move forward?” He demonstrated the move twice more.

“Everybody,
seisan
stance, left foot forward. Punching with the left. Elbow
back
! Fist swings out. Round those shoulders—this is an
obuki
technique. Sit into it! Bounce up as you twist that fist. Again.”

And again, and again, and again.

Asbjorn walked up and down the row. The technical details were so crucial—yet so difficult to internalize because of their very simplicity.

“Everybody pair off. Now we’ll do it with a partner. Dud-sempai will present a target made of his two hands, palms out.”

Dud grinned, making a target over his solar plexus.

“Now make sure you’re the right distance away. You’re hitting an inch or two beneath the surface, no more. Elbow back, fist out, sit, bounce and twist.”

Dud was pushed off-balance by the slow punch. Asbjorn made it look so easy. It was, after all, elementary.

The class struggled for twenty minutes before Asbjorn called a break. “We’ll do some sparring exercises.”

Muffled noises of relief and excitement filled the air.

He sympathized with them. Simple wasn’t always easy. Ripping through katas at high speed felt satisfying, but they were just fighting air. He wanted every move to
mean
something, to be effective as a technique in its own right. Rethinking already internalized katas meant breaking them down and rebuilding them from the ground up. It also meant his students would feel stupid and incompetent for some time. He understood the feeling all too well, but there was no help for it.

“However, we’ll go at half-speed only. No hurrying up, no cheating. I want you to focus on the elbow going back with every single technique. That’s where your power begins.”

“You think they’ll get it?” Dud asked.

“No. Not the first time. But over time, they’ll find their punches are stronger.”

Dud shrugged. “Seems like you should save these detailed breakdowns for senior seminars. Some of those kids will drop out if you make their brains work so hard. They come here to relax.”

“You think?” Asbjorn growled at his friend. “Okay, then, I’ll try not to flood them with it. But I cannot possibly dumb it down.” Asbjorn’s mind flitted to Sean, wondering if the stalker was following him that very moment. He felt his adrenaline spike and drew a deep breath to keep his physiological reactions under control.

Dud’s sigh echoed Asbjorn’s exhale. “No. I guess you can’t.”

Neither could Tiger.

Only half an hour later, Asbjorn unlocked the door to his apartment, surprised to find it dark. Asbjorn set his gi bag by the door, shed his boots and jacket, and tiptoed into the bedroom, careful not to wake Sean.

He must’ve been really tired.

He smiled, sliding out of his clothing as his eyes adjusted to the darkness. The pillows were in their customary disarray, and the comforter was bunched up to one side.